Roberta Williams' Phantasmagoria [Model S277410~70]

Released on August 24, 1995 in the USA.

Williams had long planned to design a horror game, but waited eight years for software technology to improve before doing so. Based on Williams' 550-page script, about four times the length of an average Hollywood screenplay, more than 200 people were involved in the making of Phantasmagoria, which took more than two years to develop and four months to film. Though originally budgeted for US$800,000, the game ultimately cost $4.5 million to develop, and it was filmed in a $1.5 million studio Sierra built specifically for the game.

The original title for the game was going to be Scary Tales but the name was changed to its current title during production. There is a directory for temporary files that the game installs called SCARY in honor of the early title.

The game featured a cast of 25 actors, with all filming taking place in front of a blue screen. A professional Hollywood special effects house worked on the game, and the musical score included a neo-Gregorian chant performed by a 135-voice choir. Sierra strongly promoted the game, but stressed it was intended for adult audiences. The company willingly submitted it to a ratings system, and included a password-protected censoring option within the game to tone down the graphic content.

The game was finished by the latter part of 1994, and was ready for release, however Sierra chose to call back some of the cast and crew members for two additional sessions of filming. Filming initially took an additional month and, three months later, was resumed for another couple of weeks.

The office of Bob Thompkins, Adrianne's sleazy real estate agent, is decorated with posters of girls from another Sierra adventure game, Leisure Suit Larry 6.

Export releases:
[FR] "Roberta Williams' Phantasmagoria [Model S4190120Z12Z1~7]"
[UK] "Roberta Williams' Phantasmagoria [Model S4190220Z12Z1~7]"
[DE] "Roberta Williams' Phantasmagoria [Model S4190520Z12Z1~7]"